Chapter 47
by jmsutherland
Summary: Clearing up.


Page **11** of **11**

**Chapter XLVII**

They had been up all night discussing their plan so by the time they arrived at Pseudopolis Yard they were very well prepared for what was to come. Harry, by contrast, was as unprepared as a bunch of loose ingredients scattered across a counter.

It was still raining, but now only kittens and puppies, so they were only a bit damp when they arrived. Sergeant Boltmaker said they were expected and led them into his office, where he was seated behind his desk.

"Good morning, ladies," he said, smiling, "and what can I do for you?"

It had been a long night but they'd come through it. It was going to be a long day too, but he was ready for anything. Not.

"You need to adopt Moo," said Tiffany, without introduction.

"What!?" said Harry, incredulously.

"You and Sally have to adopt Moo," Agnes added, helpfully.

"Are you crazy!?" he cried, "we're vampires, or hadn't you noticed?"

"That's precisely why you'll make ideal parents," Tiffany said.

"To say that I am not following you," said Harry, "would be a gigantic understatement."

"Look," she said, as if explaining it to a child; at least a child other than Moo, "Moo has just saved the world, I think you owe her something, don't you?"

"I think we all owe her everything, but I don't see how that would make me a fit parent."

"Actually, you'd be perfect," she said, "let me explain. We don't know why, but Moo is no longer a witch. It is as though she expended all her powers defeating the demon; so she can no longer be my apprentice. Now she's just a helpless little orphan who needs someone to look after her, preferably someone who can protect her from all and any harm, and will still be able to do that when she's ninety. Does that sound like anyone you know?"

"Well, I suppose when you put it like that…" Harry had to concede.

He'd been starting to think about what it would be like to have kids, and there was no denying that Moo was a lovely child, and bright as a firework to boot.

"What do you think, Moo?" he asked.

"It would be lovely to have a mum and dad again, sir," she said, flashing him a huge, sweet, innocent, guile-more smile.

She was manipulating emotions he wasn't even supposed to have and he didn't even care.

"I'll have to ask my future wife, of course," he said, eventually.

"Well, you'll have to ask her to be your wife first," Tiffany agreed.

"Good point," said Harry, "wait here."

He took Moo's hand, it was warm and tiny, and led her up towards Carrot's office. The Commander had gone home briefly, to see his family and inform Sir Samuel of the night's events, so it was empty. He managed to catch Sally's eye as they passed and gestured for her to follow them.

Of course it was bonkers; the whole thing was bonkers. He knew Sally would think it was bonkers. Hells, even he thought it was bonkers.

"Are you bonkers!?" she almost yelled.

"I know how it sounds, but Tiffany thinks we have to adopt her. She did save the world, after all."

"And who is this _we_ of whom you speak?" she demanded.

"Oh," said Harry, feigning abashed, "did I forget to ask you to marry me?"

"Yes you did. And what makes you think I'd have accepted if you had done?" she added, indignantly.

"Oh, I just had feeling," he said, smiling his most charming, naughty-boy smile, "and I don't have many of those."

Sally frowned: "Wait here," she said to him.

She took Moo's little hand and led her back down to Harry's office, where the witches were waiting.

"How can you think this is a good idea?" she wanted to know, "we're vampires; we can't even feel love."

Even as she said the words she wondered how she'd be able to explain that to Lucy, or her mum, for that matter.

"You're not real vampires," said Tiffany, "either of you."

This, Sally had to admit, was becoming increasingly apparent.

"What do you think, Moo?" she asked, looking down into eyes as wide and as deep and as hopeful as wishing-wells.

"It would be lovely to have a mummy again," said Moo.

Sally didn't know what she felt but she knew she'd just felt it being injected directly into her heart. She gave a resigned but happy shrug.

"We should warn you that Moo is completely incapable of telling lies," said Agnes.

Oh dear, thought Sally.

"And we don't think she's quite as obedient as she used to be," Tiffany added.

Oh, well, at least that gives us something to work with.

"Wait here," she said to Agnes and Tiffany, and took Moo back to Carrot's office.

"Don't call that man _daddy_ until I say you can, is that understood?" she cautioned, on the way.

"Yes, mummy," said Moo.

When the door had closed behind them, Harry just looked at them both blankly; almost as if he didn't know why they were there.

"Well!?" Sally demanded

"Oh, sorry," said Harry, getting down on one knee, "Salicia, my one, my only true love, will you do me the great and signal honour of consenting to be my wife?"

He cut the tip of his ring-finger with his fang and held out his hand, palm upraised.

"What do you think, Moo?" Sally asked.

"It would be lovely to have a mummy and daddy again," said Moo, with a twinkle that lit up not only her eyes but her whole face. Sally cut her own finger and touched her blood to his.

"From now, Hartmut, until the end of time," she said, solemnly.

"Yipee!" cried Moo.

Sally looked quizzically at Harry.

"You don't think our daughter has been manipulating us, do you?"

"Oh, I'm certain she has," Harry replied.

"Oh, good," said Sally, "then people with assume we're her real parents."

They shared a wry smile.

"And talking of parents…" she began.

"You're mum will be pleased," said Harry, "and I don't give a _ what my parents think anymore. In fact, if they even entertain the notion that they have any say at all in the matter, then they'll find out what a really bad boy I turned out to be. And not in the way they would have wanted."

With that, Sally picked up Moo and hugged her; the way her own mum had always hugged her. Not quite so tightly, of course, as she didn't want to break any bones.

Back in Harry's office, congratulations were in order.

"We'll have the shysters start drawing-up the necessary papers today," Sally assured Tiffany.

"Thank, you," said Tiffany, "and I understand you're soon to be married."

"Thanks to you," said Sally, with an interesting smile.

"Congratulations," gushed Agnes, "are we invited?"

"Of course," said Harry, playing with Moo's hair, "but the wedding will be in Überwald."

"Oh, that's alright," Agnes said, "we're witches; it's just a short night-flight."

"And you have to bring someone called Margs," Sally added, with a laugh, "that's VERY important."

"Indeed it is," agreed Tiffany, laughing along.

"And you must come and visit us in Lancre," said Agnes, "often!"

"That we shall," said Sally, "and you must visit us equally often. We'll want to know what Margs makes of the Big Onion."

They all nodded their agreement.

"One more thing," said Sally, drawing all their attentions, "until I have spoken to my mother this must remain our secret."

"Of course," Tiffany agreed, "until then no word shall go beyond us, we Famous Five."

"Woof!" barked Moo.

And so the bargain was sealed.

They'd agreed that Moo should immediately move in with Sally, so that they could get better acquainted and, while Moo and the two witches were saying a temporary goodbye, Harry whispered in Sally's ear:

"You have to tell Angua."

"I know," she said, "I'll take Moo along tomorrow. It'll give us something to talk about while we're _sewing_."

She'd said the word with all the venom she normally reserved for _vegetarian_, but Harry got the feeling she was rather looking forward to it.

When _The Guardian _hit the streets that morning it was selling like items of soft sweet food made from a mixture of flour, fat, eggs and sugar, straight from the oven. The ink was still wet on many of the copies, but this hardly mattered as the persistent drizzle made them all wet soon enough anyway, along with everything else. At least the rain problem seemed to have taken care of the fly problem and everybody seemed happy with the bargain. Apart from the lizard population, of course, which included many of the people who wrote for _The Post, _Honeysuckle thought.

The main reasons that _The Grauniad_ was selling so well were that it had three perspectives on the big –the only- story: Selene on the roofs of the square, Sacharissa on the ground and Honeysuckle watching the casualties come in at the hospital; and that it carried detailed and terrifying photographs, not only of the thing itself, but also the fighting around it. William was enormously proud of the whole thing. But at least part of the reason was that the opposition was rapidly evaporating.

_The Chronicle_ had already ceased publication and _The Tribune_ looked like it was headed the same way. _The Banner_ carried stories of three-headed chickens and flying pigs, but at least these were true; it also had Globalists1 who claimed they could predict your future, advice columns written by invented people addressing invented _problems_ not written in by other invented people; and sports reports2. As it had seldom carried anything other than these things, it was likely to survive.

_The Post_ itself was now little more than a down-market version of _Tiittler_, which was perhaps all it had ever been. Its basic message remained the same: every change is for the worse; unless it is a change back to how things used to be in the past -but without the hatred it no longer had any real purpose. Oh, it tried to stir up resentment towards the likes of Agatean restaurants and Mouldavian street-traders, but everyone could see its heart wasn't really in it. The Omnians had finally done for it, just as it had always predicted they would. It turned out to have been the only accurate forecast it had ever made.

Lord Bothermore himself had not been seen since "The Conspiracy" story had broken and nor had any of his editors. Admittedly, one of them no longer had a paper to edit, but this obvious lack of leadership had many people wondering who was supposed to be in charge, including the people who were supposed to be in charge themselves.

_The Gadairun_ published its fifth edition around lunchtime, at which point Gudrun called a halt. William was outraged by this insubordination and he demanded to know who she thought she was.

"Gudrun Gustaffsdottir, sir," she replied, her voice full of uncharacteristic irritation, "and if Mr. Larssonson's men don't perform essential maintenance on this press today then there shall be no editions of _The Guardian _tomorrow; none at all."

Sacharissa had noticed her getting increasingly feisty recently, especially with William.

"Ok," he said, holding up his arms; still having enough sense to know where his self-interest lay, "we're all tired, so let's take a few hours off."

Actually, neither Selene nor Otto ever got tired; William was too full of hype to be tired and Gudrun too full of feist. Sacharissa and Honeysuckle, on the other hand, were almost asleep on their feet. The rain had picked-up again, to the extent that by the time they got back to Honeysuckle's mum's they were both drenched. They each refused any food or drink and staggered upstairs to their room. The only reason they managed to undress, rather than just fall onto the bed, was that their soaking clothes were really uncomfortable. They were both asleep even before their eyes had closed.

When Honeysuckle awoke in the late-afternoon sunshine Sacharissa was cuddling up to her back and snoring softly and the last thing on her mind was that they were late for work. She'd slept with Sacharissa lots of times before, of course, and with Rose more times than she could count, but this was different. They were in the nuddy.

She loved her mum and her sisters, she also loved Rose and she'd slept with all of them, but not like this: she was _in love_ with Sacharissa, and this was different.

She noticed that Sacharissa had stopped snoring and she now snuggled up to her even more tightly. She could feel her girlfriend's soft, warm skin against hers and hear her hot breath in her ear. It made her tingle allover.

"Well, this is interesting, girlfriend, isn't it?" Sacharissa whispered.

Honeysuckle thought that she couldn't have understated it better. She turned over so that they were looking into each other's eyes.

"VERY, interesting," she said.

"Unfortunately," Sacharissa said, "we're going to have to go to work."

"Really?" said Honeysuckle, disappointed.

"I'm afraid so," said Sacharissa, "otherwise I won't be able to persuade William to put you on the payroll."

"Really!?" asked Honeysuckle, suddenly excited; in a different way.

"Well, our circulation has suddenly expanded hugely, so we're going to need more reporters."

"Really?" Honeysuckle asked.

"Yes, really," said Sacharissa, "and then I think you should move in with me."

"Really!?"

"Just so that your sister can have her room back, of course."

"Of course," Honeysuckle agreed, "I didn't know you had a spare room."

"I don't."

"Or a spare bed?"

"I don't have one of those either."

"Oh," said Honeysuckle.

They looked into each other's faces for a moment, and then they shared a kiss more passionate, intense and exciting than either of them had ever thought possible.

And then they got up and started looking for some dry clothes.

1 People who believed the world was round.

2 It also had "competitions" for cash money that you couldn't possibly win even if you were the only person playing.


End file.
